109 refinement of sharp and carefully focussed interventions. The review and strengthening of the campaign of the South African Human Rights Commission on “Rolling Back Xenophobia” and the allocation of the necessary resources for this purpose is one of the solutions being implemented. In addition to this, numerous NGOs and other civil society organizations, including the churches are playing a role in maximizing education and awareness within South Africa to combat xenophobic tendencies/attitudes and actions. The Department of Arts and Culture has during the reporting period hosted about 49 community dialogues across the country to encourage nation building, social cohesion and the fight against xenophobia and racism in our communities. The National Social Cohesion summit, which the President defined as a mechanism to bind society together, including foreigners and nationals, was an important development in July 2012 – it focussed on strategic initiatives to deal with xenophobia in South African society. It is clear from the existing evidence that many South Africans still have misperceptions, stereotypes and uncertainties about the presence of foreigners in the country. An important problem is that many South Africans fail to make any distinction between the different categories of migrants in the country. Many people tend to classify all foreigners in the same way, be they refugees, illegals, economic migrants or unauthorised migrants. All the different categories of migrants, however, have their own set of rights and entitlements. The obligations of government vary according to each category. Officials dealing with migrants are not always able to differentiate between the various categories of migrants with the result that asylum seekers or refugees at times cannot access the services they are entitled to. Socio-economic circumstances precipitate some resentment towards foreigners who in certain sections of the labour market seem to be favoured by employers because they work hard for much lower wages than are offered to citizens. The competition for jobs and resources – with South Africa’s education system being weaker than its neighbours – sometimes finds that foreigners are better qualified and willing to be paid less. These incidents are commonplace globally. Most importantly, it appears that ordinary South African citizens would like to have their perspectives seriously considered or their voices heard on how to deal with the issues of the influx of foreigners in the country. This is why government and civil society continue to organise dialogues, summits and workshops to open space for participation by people at grassroots levels in the discussions around the sources of xenophobia, solutions and management thereof of immigrants, towards the development a co-formulated migration strategies which will have majority buy-in. Just as it is important to hold a national debate on the many dimensions and aspects of migration policy, so it is also critical for these discussions to take place at the grassroots level. The attacks on foreigners will not end nor will re-integration take place until communities have satisfied themselves that their grievances, questions and concerns have been discussed and addressed. Non-South African citizens need to be encouraged to participate in these forums94. One of the triggers of violence is the occupation of national housing stock by non-South African citizens. RDP houses were constructed to enable South African citizens to reside in them. The sale or rental of RDP houses to non-South African citizens exacerbates the housing shortage, compounds the pressure on informal settlements and foments community 94 See HSRC Reports on xenophobia – www.hsrc.ac.za 109